Welcome to the Overwhelmed Brain Podcast, helping you navigate the difficulties in your life and relationships.
These are my personal opinions.
Always seek a professional when you're making choices about your mental health and wellbeing.
Hello, welcome to the show.
Thank you for taking the time to listen to me.
Some guy on the internet, some guy on a podcast somewhere that's been doing this since 2013 and helping people navigate through life's challenges, really.
Life and relationships and all the difficulties that come along with both.
It's complex.
I think life can be very complex.
And I think we can make it more complex than we should.
I mean, sometimes we do that.
Sometimes we make things more complex, more difficult than they need to be.
And I spend a lot of time thinking about questions of reflection.
For example, I get a lot of messages from people that say, so-and-so is doing this.
I don't like it.
It's hurtful.
I want them to change.
I think they can change.
And so I'm staying here until I see those changes.
Or they don't use those words, but...
I'm staying in the situation or the relationship because I know there's a chance they can change.
I've seen them be a better person, the non-toxic person, the healthier person.
I've seen this in them.
I remember back in 2002 when they were so nice to me that one day I know it's in them.
So I get those messages a lot.
I'm not trying to minimize or invalidate or make people feel bad for saying that.
I'm saying this is a very common thing.
I've felt this way myself. where we believe somebody has the ability to change.
And sometimes they do.
Sometimes they have that ability and they choose not to.
And sometimes they don't for whatever reason.
They don't believe they're wrong.
They don't believe there's a problem.
And so, because of that belief, they don't believe they have the ability to change, because they believe they don't need to.
So what do we do with somebody who doesn't seem like they're changing, but we believe they're going to change or they have the ability to change.
This is where I simplify things.
I look at somebody and I ask myself, first of all, have they made any changes?
Have they made any progress toward improving themselves in any way?
That's one question.
Another question is do they reflect on their behaviors when they're pointed out or when they consider them later on like gee?
You know, I probably shouldn't have yelled at you.
I'm really sorry.
Do they consider those things?
Do they reflect?
Third question might be, do they apologize?
Do they take responsibility?
I shouldn't have said that.
I'm so sorry.
And then do they acknowledge and empathize?
You know, that must have felt pretty rotten when I said that.
I'm so sorry.
And you didn't deserve that.
And I definitely and here's another question.
I definitely will not do that again, which is part of an apology.
Part of an apology is committing to never doing something ever again.
If a person does something hurtful to you and then they apologize and they commit to doing it or never doing it again, That's a pretty good apology as far as I'm concerned.
It may not be enough.
Like maybe they hurt you badly and an apology is not enough.
This goes right along the lines of accepting apologies or forgiving.
I'm not a big fan of forgiving.
Let me reword that.
I don't think you have to forgive.
My personal opinion.
Some people believe in it and my thoughts on that is if it works for you, then definitely do it.
But if something or if they did something so bad, so hurtful, that forgiving feels like letting them get away with it, then in my opinion you don't have to forgive.
You can just move forward.
You can still have the relationship if you want.
But it's not necessary to forgive somebody who hurt you that badly.
But it doesn't mean you hold it against them for the rest of their lives, unless you want to.
But if you're going to do that, then maybe you shouldn't be in their life and they shouldn't be in yours, because it's a toxic environment that's created from that.
I have episodes on forgiveness and apologies and things like that, so I won't get into that too much right now.
But, going through the list of questions and reflections and considerations of the complexities of life, of the difficulties that we run into, and one of them and i'll bring it back around here one of the things that i just mentioned is if someone can change, can they change?
That's the question right, and when you say well yes, it's possible, then you may put yourself in a position of waiting.
And if you've been listening a while, you've heard me say, hoping, wishing, and praying.
You hope they change.
You wish they change.
You pray they change.
And then They are either going to or not.
But that's why I come back to reflections and considerations and self-questioning.
I reflect on if they've changed up to this point.
Have they made progress?
And if the answer is yes, then I ask myself, okay...
Was there progress after progress?
Hey, they read a book and the book helped them understand themselves.
Or they went to therapy and therapy helped them understand themselves.
And now they have learned what it takes to become a better person or improve themselves.
But have they changed?
Have they progressed?
Have they moved forward in any way?
I look at trends.
I look at the progress people make over time, because sometimes change is hard and it takes a while and people have to get on board with a new level of understanding themselves and a A new way of being.
And so this step-by-step process for some people can take a while.
Progress can take time.
And so people progress at different levels and different ways and at different intervals and speed, and all that.
But there has to be progress after progress.
There has to be a steady inclination of improvement.
If you look at history and there's not a steady inclination of improvement, there will not be.
I think that's probably one of the most important points I make over and over again on this show.
But for this particular episode, if there's no steady improvement, if there's no steady progress, little steps of incline going up, the trend line going up.
If there's no progress, there will not be.
And if there will not be progress, that means tomorrow.
No matter how much you wish, hope and pray, it will not change.
They will not change.
So my default go-to with this is, Paul, what if you're wrong?
My answer is, so what? if I'm wrong and they do change, bonus, you get the cherry on top.
You get the best of all worlds because now you're at your lowest in thought and feeling, where you finally admit, and you finally feel defeat, that they're not going to change.
Let's just say you get to that point.
You're at your lowest thought and feeling about a person or an environment that you're in, work or whatever a boss.
And you finally get to the point where you say they're not going to change.
I will accept that and coming to that place of acceptance.
Now you have a new belief system.
You have a new reality.
It's a grounding place.
It's a flat place to platform off of.
You can leap off of a solid ground.
That's what you're doing.
You're building a solid ground from which to build on top of.
The solid ground gets formed or built by you creating a new belief or reality.
And that reality might be something like, I know they're not going to change.
Because if you think they might be able to change, so I'll stick around long enough to find out.
If it happens, you're not on solid ground.
So I like solid ground.
I like putting myself on solid ground to get rid of complex thinking and concerns and worries and predictions and all that stuff.
We need something solid.
That's why I like decision-making requires solid ground.
And sometimes we have to create our own solid ground.
So a decision might be.
I know they're not going to change because I've not seen any progress toward that.
And if I have seen progress toward that, Has there been progress after progress?
That steady inclination of improvement.
If there hasn't been, now we can say, we can create this new belief system.
We can create our solid ground.
There hasn't been, therefore I'm going to decide that the new reality is that they won't change.
And if I take that new reality and make a decision from that place, if I choose something from a solid ground, then I have all the data I need.
This episode of The Overwhelmed Brain is sponsored by BetterHelp.
In many ways, it's healing for me to be able to talk about the mental and psychological health challenges that we all face.
And as I help you navigate the difficulties in life and relationships, I actually help myself too.
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So let's just say that you have this solid ground thinking.
I know they won't change.
Therefore, here's what I'm going to do.
It's the same type of question I've asked before.
If you knew for a fact that the person that you are dealing with, that you're working with, that you are living with, will never, ever change.
If you knew that for a fact, what would you do then?
That's the kind of question that grounds me.
I think that's a very grounding question for anyone to ask.
If that were true, what would you do?
That's a very grounding question.
It brings a, probably a new reality, because the old reality is hoping, wishing and praying in that rut, thinking the new reality is okay.
I know this for a fact Because this has been what it is.
So I'm going to look at the trend and realize this is a trend and that history creates the present moment.
So I create this present moment of reality in the solid ground from which I can build upon, and I build upon by making decisions based on the reality I just created.
I hope that makes sense.
It makes sense in my mind when I do this.
Will this person ever change?
No.
I've come to that conclusion.
Now that I know that that's the truth, what decision do I make now?
What decision do I make today?
What plans do I start creating for myself, for the other people in my life that I care about?
What plans do I start making?
So that I have some sense of direction, some beacon to follow, to go toward.
That's what I want to do.
And so I simplify my life by creating this new reality and making a decision from this new reality and bringing it back to somebody writing to me and asking me you know what do I do?
This person does this to me and they're hurtful and they're mean or whatever.
This is the process.
It's the process that you can go through yourself so that you can understand what decision to make next.
And like I was saying, let's just say I'm wrong.
Let's They will not change.
Now you have this reality and you make a decision from that reality.
I want to get a divorce.
I want to leave.
I want to quit my job.
Whatever.
And that reality is now set in motion.
Your direction is set in motion.
And they show up the next day saying, I'm so wrong.
I've been wrong for so long.
I'm so sorry.
I've hurt you.
I've done this.
I've done that.
Wow, I'm a total jackass and I'm so sorry and I just want to start over and fix this and make sure that I never hurt you again.
Let's just say that they said all of that.
First thing, I'm going to be skeptical, of course, because where were you before?
Where was this admission before?
Where was your empathy before?
That's the skepticism.
But if you're serious, if this is true, then I will delay what I'm going to do.
And I'm not saying this is what you do.
I'm saying my thought process.
I'm going to delay what I'm going to do to find out if you're authentic here.
Find out if you're genuine.
I'm going to delay what I'm going to do.
Now, it won't be long.
If I see in a few weeks, for example, that there has been no changes, or you were playing me until you got your way, until I recommitted to the relationship or whatever it is, and you return to your old behaviors, then I know it was just because you were afraid of loss.
Your fear of loss.
This person's fear of loss caused them to react in a way to manipulate me into believing that they've changed or they want to change, But in reality they just feared loss so much that they would do anything to keep it.
So they manipulated me into believing that they were changing, if that makes sense.
So what happens is people get so afraid that they'll do anything to avoid the loss.
In the case of a romantic relationship, somebody will do anything to avoid losing the person that they've been hurting.
Let's just say they're emotionally abusive, they've been hurtful, and now you're ready to go.
And they say, wait, wait, wait, don't go.
I feel so bad.
I'm so sorry.
So they have this huge surprise coming at them like, hey, I'm not going to take this abuse anymore.
I'm leaving.
And then they finally realize, whoa, boy, I better stop acting like that.
And hopefully they realize, whoa, I've been a real jerk.
I better work on that.
I better get some healing and they actually make those changes or not, which is why you know you can choose from your new reality.
Your new reality is no, you won't change.
So you stay in that reality.
You don't just jump off and go into another reality.
You stay there and you wait to see if what they're saying is true.
And by staying in this new grounded reality that you created and let's just say that new reality is.
I know they won't change.
Then what you watch for are signs that they have changed or they haven't.
And you do it for a long enough period of time.
And this is an important part where uh, how can I say?
This old stimuli triggers them and they either act badly or act different.
How does this, what does that look like?
Let's just say that you talk to your ex.
I'll use a romantic relationship, for example.
You talk to your ex and they used to get jealous and they would give you a dirty look or they would be overtly abusive.
I can't believe you're doing that.
You're cheating on me.
Whatever they say, and it doesn't feel very good, of course not, and they don't trust you.
They're insecure, all these dysfunctional and toxic behaviors.
But let's just say that they're turning over a new leaf and they're starting to heal, and you talk about calling your ex.
How are they reacting?
Are they like hey, have a great conversation.
Say hi to them for me.
Whatever.
Are they like that?
And I'm not saying that would be genuinely authentic.
I'm just saying you're going to get a sense of how they react to any stimuli that used to trigger them.
So if it's jealousy about the ex or they feel left out because you are going out with your friends, whatever triggered them in the past those things are the tests.
That's how you find out if someone has really changed.
Let's just say it's a family member.
And one of you is happy the way your mom treated you and the other one hates your mom.
So now you have this conflict and you've never gotten along with your sibling because they've always hated your mom, or you hated your mom and they loved her, or whatever.
And this conflict is in there.
And now let's just say that one of you has, you know, improved and reflected and worked on this and realized they didn't want a bad relationship with their sibling.
And whether the mom is good or bad or toxic or not...
You just want a better relationship.
So you both work on improving or the person that was the hardest to deal with works on improving it.
Then you bring up your mom as a topic.
And your mom as a topic is the old trigger.
So let's see what happens now. does your sibling have the same reaction?
Does it go back to where they were?
Because if you believe they've done some changes, or they believe they've done some changes and that old trigger triggers them, that old stimuli triggers them, then clearly Nothing's changed.
Or if something has changed, of course, they still may be working on it.
But you should also notice a level of intensity or decrease in intensity if somebody is working on something.
For example, somebody is emotionally abusive and they I'll use the jealousy example you call your ex and they normally get jealous.
And after they said, Oh, I'm changing, I'm working on myself.
You call your ex again, or you talk about your ex, just mention their name.
And they go, Yeah, they're trying to process it.
They realize that it's a trigger and they're working on it, and they say OK yes, I'm working on that for sure, because I feel myself getting triggered and I know it's not right.
It's not fair to you to get triggered.
I need to work on that some more.
So they acknowledge it. or they step away and they work on it.
So yes, there are in between times where we can process and work on this stuff.
And when somebody is going through healing and change, it may not be instantaneous.
They may have to fall sometimes and they mess up.
And now we can choose to say, okay, you messed up, but you need to work on this.
So we can give people the benefit of the doubt.
We can get to the point where we feel like giving them more opportunities to heal, to change, to stop treating us so badly, or whatever.
We can offer that.
But I think, and again, this is also important.
I think it's important to offer that opportunity.
Only after you've created the new reality.
Only after you've created a solid ground for yourself.
Because what will happen is, if you are still stuck in hoping and wishing and praying someone changes and you offer benefit of the doubt and second chances and fifth chances and a hundred chances, then what you're doing is offering something on unsteady or shaky ground.
If I can continue using this metaphor, if you offer something like that, some second chance or a hundredth chance on unsteady ground or shaky ground the house of cards, for example then what you're doing is offering something fragile on top of something fragile, something unmeasurable on top of something unmeasurable.
And that's really the key to all of this is that when you're on solid ground, when you have a new reality, you have something measurable.
I can measure this.
This is the fact or facts that I've come up with.
This is the reality that I now hold to be true.
This is my new belief system.
That's measurable because you've come to an absolute.
Whereas, what's immeasurable?
Is that the right word?
Unmeasurable.
What is something that you cannot measure?
It's hard to measure hoping and wishing and praying that someone will change, because you are not steady and solid in yourself about it.
When you get to 100%, you're steady and solid in yourself.
You have steady, solid ground.
When you're not at 100, you might be at 25 or less, meaning you might believe there's a 25 chance that someone can change.
There's a 25% chance.
So I'm going to take that risk and continue making decisions from this 25% sure of myself place.
That's unsteady ground.
And it can be measured sort of, but when you're at 100%, you know that your measurement is accurate.
When you're at 25%, it's not accurate.
You're just guessing.
Guessing is not reality.
I mean, it is in a way, but it's not.
I mean, yes, our best guess of reality is reality.
If you want to look at it philosophically or scientifically, our best guess of reality is reality.
But what happens when we aren't sure of something and it could go either way?
Like when you look up into the sky and you see the sun, you realize there's a bright object up there.
It's pretty factual.
I think we can all agree on the bright object.
But when you look at someone and you think, well, they could change, they may change.
I believe they can change, but you're not 100% sure they can.
It's not like, hey, there's a bright object in the sky.
It's, I'm not too sure.
And then we build on top of that unsteady ground, which is really what I'm getting to at this final point of all this is that we can have this house of cards and build a house of cards on it, and build a house of cards on top of that and hope that There's not a tiny little breeze that knocks it all down.
That's the reality too.
I mean, if we look at it that way, if you believe somebody can change and they fail, changing day after day after day, the house of cards is always knocked down and you keep rebuilding it as long as you believe they can change.
I'm not saying that people can't change.
Please don't take it that way.
I've seen many, many changes.
My Healed Being program, many amazing changes with fantastic people underneath those changes.
They come out of the woodwork like their own blocks their own insecurities finally get out of the way and they stop being hurtful they stop being toxic and Suddenly they are like the best people.
I'm not saying the best people in the world, I'm saying the best they could possibly show up as, and It's amazing.
There are so many good people that I've seen change, and When they don't change is what we're talking about.
When there's no progress is what we're talking about.
So my suggestion to you is, if you're thinking that somebody might be able to change, because you've seen them change back 20 years ago or you've seen what you like about them,
And it comes out on occasion or frequently or infrequently, but the rest of it is kind of toxic or hurtful or abusive or just hard to deal with.
Just remind yourself to consider, reflect and ask yourself questions like have I seen this person progress?
Have I seen progress after progress?
Am I just hopeful that they'll change?
Or deep down, what do I believe?
That's an important question.
Deep down, what do I believe?
Because there's a difference between deep down I know they have it in them and deep down do I really believe they'll change.
Because the deep down stuff, your truth, your truth is in there.
Your steady ground is in there.
And pulling it out sometimes has to override your hope.
Pulling out your deep truth.
And that's crazy.
Isn't that scary to think about?
You have hope that things will change and get better.
But in order to actually access the truth, you may have to override hope to get there.
I'm not saying you will override hope.
It really depends on what your deepest truth is.
But I look to my deepest truth, which is typically something I don't want to be true.
I pull that out.
Do I really believe this is possible?
And part of me is going to say, well, of course it's possible.
Anyone can change if they choose to change.
If they want to change, if they want to heal, anyone can do that.
Absolutely.
But in this case, what have I witnessed so far and what has happened over these past months and years that has brought me to a new belief, a new reality that's probably deep inside of me, that maybe I don't want to admit?
And that could be the question.
What do I don't want to admit?
I think I'll keep that in this episode too.
What don't I want to admit?
What don't I want to be true?
And the deeper question is if I strip away my hope and my wishing and my praying, what is actually true?
I'm not saying you'll come up with something.
I'm just saying we sometimes have to get past our own blocks, our own armor.
We have this armor that we want to wear to protect ourselves from something that we don't necessarily want to believe.
But if we choose to believe it, we can actually make new choices and new decisions from that place of steady ground so that we can build on top of that.
And if they choose to change anyway, even if we don't believe they will.
Great.
Now we have a new steady ground.
That's how this is created.
We have one steady ground that we start with and a new steady ground if they choose to change, and then we find out if that's true, going forward.
I hope I've given you something to think about today.
Thank you for joining me for another episode of The Overwhelmed Brain.
I want to thank our patrons of the week, Maria and Heather.
And anyone that gives to the show and donates to the show, thank you so much.
Keeps the show going and keeps the lights on.
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I do what I can.
But some people value the show and they want to give back and they do so financially.
And That's what I see every now and then.
See, people will offer their financial support.
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Thank you again.
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Talking about difficult relationships.
If you are in a difficult relationship and you want to figure out what the hell is going on, if you're not sure what's happening, you're not sure if you're in an emotionally abusive relationship or if it's just normal relationship, difficulties head over to Love and Abuse over at loveandabusecom.
That is my podcast.
I've been doing that since 2019 and it is very helpful for those who are trying to determine exactly what's going on in their relationship.
If you need that, that's over at loveandabusecom, and I also help people who are the difficult one.
If you are the person that has been listening to this and realize gee, that might be me,
I might be the difficult one.
Head over to healedbeing.com.
Take the free lessons and learn if you are that person or if you're not.
Maybe it's the person you're with or somebody you know, but the lessons will tell you everything you need to know.
If you resonate with them and you want to go forward with that, you can do so.
There's an entire comprehensive program too, really help not only save yourself, but sometimes save relationships on the brink of destruction.
I've seen relationships at the cliff be pulled back and it takes both people to want to work on it.
So there has to be that.
But I've seen a lot of crazy great things happen over at Healed Being.
If that's something you want to check out, go over to healedbeingcom and sign up for the free lessons today.
And with that, just keep your mind open, because that's how you make the best decisions, and be firm in your decisions and actions so that you can create the life you want.
Always take steps to grow and evolve.
You are powerful beyond measure.
And above all, and this is something I absolutely know to be true about you, you are amazing.
